


Commoners

by metis_fe



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-12-23 20:07:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21087065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/metis_fe/pseuds/metis_fe
Summary: They’re two common girls both at Garreg Mach to find a way to climb out of poverty. You’d think they’d get on well.





	Commoners

Leonie didn’t get Dorothea. At all.

They didn’t cross paths much. Leonie spent her time outside of the classroom training, learning from Jeralt, or in the knights’ quarters. The only times Leonie saw Dorothea was flirting with one of the knights, or chatting up a student over lunch in the dining quarters, or buttering up a merchant in town. Leonie didn’t care much. She had no interest in being on the receiving end of that kind of syrupy sweet-talk, and she knew there was no danger of that ever being the case, since Leonie lacked the one key quality Dorothea was interested in: money.

So she was surprised when she found Dorothea alone in the training quarters, no handsome knights in sight, throwing lightning bolt after fireball at one of the dummies. Dorothea’s way of summoning magic looked entirely different from Marianne’s soft coaxing motions or Lysithea’s forceful strikes. Dorothea danced through her gestures, fire and thunder coming in rhythmic explosions. The intensity in her eyes was like nothing Leonie had seen from her before. Lightning currents began to crackle on the surface of her skin as she conjured forth one last thunderclap that reduced her target to nothing but a lump of cinders on a stick.

‘I think it’s dead,’ Leonie said.

Dorothea started as if she hadn’t known Leonie was even there, and then burst into giggles. ‘Sorry! You ever just feel the need to hit something really, really hard?’

‘That’s practically my favourite hobby. Not one I thought you’d be interested in, though. Something eating you?’

‘Oh, you know,’ Dorothea said, as if Leonie the poor peasant had some natural understanding of the problems a fashionable city girl faced. She slumped down on the benches with a dramatic sigh and set her delicate chin in her hand. ‘I had such a terrible date last night. He spent half the time describing the “genius” sewerage system in of Derdriu in disgusting detail, and the other half staring at my chest. And then this morning, he had the gall to tell me that it wouldn’t work out between us!’

That sounded like it worked out fine to Leonie. Neither wanted to see the other again, so they came to a mutual decision to end it. But of course Dorothea took it as a slight bad enough to light the training room on fire.

‘I don’t get it. Why do you keep dating these guys if you hate them all so much?’

‘Well, I don’t know that I hate them unless I date them, do I.’ Dorothea looked so smug with her clever little response that Leonie felt herself get instantly angry. Leonie had worked so hard just to get her foot in the door at Garreg Mach, and Dorothea had waltzed right in only to waste all her time on boys.

‘Is that really all you’re here for? Just to go on a bunch of dates and only do any training when they piss you off?’

Dorothea’s face went dark. Maybe Leonie had overstepped a little. But it was true, wasn’t it? That’s all Dorothea did. ‘I’m here for the same reason you are, Leonie,’ she said, before gathering her things and leaving Leonie alone with a pile of ashes in the shape of a man.

***

Leonie definitely wasn’t avoiding Dorothea. She was sure Dorothea wasn’t avoiding her either. They just so happened to not interact with each other at all for several weeks, until the professor by chance happened to pair them up for stable duty. And because neither had been avoiding the other, it wasn’t at all awkward as they stood in silence brushing the horses down.

A loud noise from outside the stables startled the horse Dorothea was brushing, and it let out a neigh and shook its mane out violently. Dorothea dropped her brush with a squeal. She picked it back up sheepishly and started brushing again.

‘Sorry, I’m not very good with animals.’

Leonie raised an eyebrow. ‘Dontcha have horses in the big city?’ She imagined Dorothea’s disgust if she ever saw Leonie’s village, with chickens, goats, donkeys and more all wandering in and out of everyone’s homes.

‘I… Well, let’s just say I had a few bad encounters with them as a child. Horses and I, we just don’t really get along. We don’t have much in common, after all.’ She smiled in a way that conjured up dread in Leonie’s gut. ‘Horses spend their time in training, and waiting to charge into battle, and I like… Oh, trivial things like tea parties, and dating boys, and singing.’ 

‘Hey, I like singing! And tea!’

‘Why, I didn’t realise you were a horse, Leonie!’

Ugh. Leonie hated double talk. Alright, time for her to suck it up and get this over with.

‘Look, I’m sorry if I was rude that time in the training quarters. I just meant… It took a lot of begging and hard work me to get accepted into this academy, so when I see someone who looks like they’re wasting the opportunity, it makes me mad. And, I don’t know you very well, so I guess I assumed, and I shouldn’t have done that.’

Dorothea stopped brushing the horse and stood quietly for a moment before saying, ‘Do you ever think about marriage, Leonie?’

‘What?’ How did they get from Leonie apologising to marriage? What was going on in that girl’s brain?

‘I know you’re here to train as a mercenary,’ Dorothea said. Leonie was surprised Dorothea had paid enough attention to her to even pick that up. ‘But if you married a rich noble, or a merchant, then you wouldn’t have to worry about doing mercenary work. You’d be free to follow your dreams.’

‘My dream is to lead my own mercenary troop. If I married some poncey noble I would lose my freedom, not gain it.’

Dorothea shook her head and almost stamped her foot. Leonie couldn’t understand why she was getting so agitated over something that had nothing to do with her. ’One day your body will be old and tired, and you won’t be able to fight anymore. What will you do then?’

‘I don’t know! I haven’t thought that far ahead! By then… I’ll probably have kids to take care of me.’

‘Kids! Aha! So you have thought about marriage!’

‘Well, yeah, obviously someday I wanna get hitched, but for love! Not for money!’

Dorothea made a little noise of surprise in the back of her throat. In a very quiet voice she said, ‘That’s what I want, too.’ Leonie found she couldn’t really say anything in response to that, and they passed the rest of their stable duty in silence.

***

Time passed, and war declared. After years with only her fellow rough-and-tumblr mercenaries for company, all at once Leonie found herself at the monastery again, surrounded by the nobles and well-to-do commoners of her school days. Not that she was complaining. She was fond of them all, and glad they were still alive. Even seeing Dorothea again was an odd comfort to her, although they had never been particularly close. On their first meeting, Dorothea had lifted reached out her hand to run her fingers through Leonie’s ponytail. ‘You grew your hair out,’ she said. ‘It’s cute.’

‘Yeah, ain’t I the cutest mercenary you ever saw?’

‘Well,’ Dorothea said with a little smile, ‘maybe.’ The professor, Leonie thought, and felt the impulse to declare competition surge in her again, like she hadn’t felt in years. She shook it off. That was all best left behind. There wasn’t much point in trying to reach the standard of someone who’d fused with a goddess, after all.

In between training, and war councils, and battle, Leonie found herself spending more time than she expected with Dorothea and her little band of orphan children. They sat altogether in a circle in the ruins of the old cathedral playing games and singing songs. At first Leonie was worried that the songs she taught them were considerably cruder than what they learned in choir practice, but when she looked over to Dorothea to make sure she hadn’t keeled over in a faint from the lyrics, she saw instead a look of pure delight on her face as she clapped along. At once Leonie decided the next time she was in a tavern she’d ask after the bawdiest song any of her drinking buddies knew. Anything to get Dorothea smiling like that.

When the kids got sick of singing and ran off to play in the courtyard, Leonie leaned back and gazed fondly after them. Glancing over at Dorothea, she said, ‘Remember back at school when you used to harangue me all the time about my future?’

‘I don’t recall myself doing any haranguing. In fact, if I were pressed, I’d say you were the one haranguing me over my leisure activities.’

Leonie laughed. She had been kind of preoccupied by that. Didn’t seem to matter at all, now. ’Maybe it was a bit of both. Whatever, I didn’t mean to start up old arguments. But if you asked now, I’d say I wanted this.’

Dorothea turned her head around to look at Leonie so quickly Leonie worried that she’d strain something. ‘This?’ she said, eyes wide, clasping her hand to her chest.

‘Yeah, a pack of squealing kids to listen to all the stories of all my glorious feats during the war. And I’d have a partner who’d chime in at all the most exciting parts to say, that’s not what happened! This is how it really went!’ At that, Dorothea laughed. ‘I think I’d like that kind of life, after all this fighting is done.’

Dorothea nodded slowly. ‘But even after the war, you’ll still be a mercenary. Still killing people for money.’

‘Or protecting people for money. There’s always thieves, Dorothea. Monsters, even. Vulnerable people need looking out for. It’s not like I’m going to accept any old job. I’m only going to do the work I believe in. But you know, I do need money, and fighting’s what I’m good at. Work is work.’ Dorothea still looked unsure, but Leonie was pretty sure that was a concept that hit home for her. ‘What about you? You still looking for a rich man to marry? I’m sure a lot of them’d be up for marrying a drop dead gorgeous war hero.’ 

‘No.’ She sounded firm. ‘I don’t think I could bear that anymore. I still worry about my future but… What freedom could I gain by throwing half of it away?’ She shook her head, smiled at Leonie and then looked out over where the kids were still messing around. ’No, I know what’s really important to me now.’

‘You know, you have a lot of friends in high places now. They’d never let you be forgotten. Hey, you’ve even got me! I don’t have any strings to pull, but I promise you I’ll always be good to buy you a drink and lend you an ear.’

‘Somehow I think I’d end up being the one buying the drinks.’ Leonie couldn’t help but laugh. It was probably true, after all. ‘But thank you, Leonie. I’ll remember that.’

* * *

Dorothea returned to Enbarr rebuild the Mittelfrank Opera Company after the war. When they embarked on a tour across Fòdlan, she knew no one better to call on for protection than Leonie and her mercenaries. Together they were the respective delight and terror of every tavern and pub the continent over. When the tour was over and the opera company at the height of its popularity, Dorothea retired, and Leonie found that in peace time mercenary work had dried up. She proposed to Dorothea that they open an orphanage, to which Dorothea gladly agreed. It is said they were always followed by the laughter of the happy children they raised together.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I thought Dorothea and Leonie had a potentially interesting dynamic, so I thought I'd explore it in the rough format of a support chain.
> 
> If you're interested in chatting anything FE-related, I'm on twitter at MetisFe


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